


It's a beautiful and a burning thing

by LynyrdLionheart



Category: Fairy Tail
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-19
Updated: 2017-11-19
Packaged: 2019-02-04 04:27:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12763140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LynyrdLionheart/pseuds/LynyrdLionheart
Summary: "She had been dying in his arms, and now that he had almost lost her he couldn't risk losing her again" - Semi AU  from a Tumblr prompt.  Erza is killed, and then saved by Ultear's Arc of Time.





	It's a beautiful and a burning thing

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic for Fairy Tail. I binge watched the anime (when I was supposed to be working on nanowrimo...ooops?) and fell in love with the relationship between Erza and Jellal. Obviously, that means I had to write fic for them. The title comes from "Don't Let Me Be Lonely" by The Band Perry.

She is dead.

               It’s an arrow through Jellal’s heart, and even as he falls to his knees next to her and gathers her in his arms, he knows he won’t feel a pulse.   The part of his heart that beats out her name – _Erza… Erza.._ – it’s gone silent, and for  the first time since he was a child stroking her hair through his fingers,  Jellal  feels  something close to peace.

               _He hates it._

If peace means Erza is gone, he wants no part of it.

               Erza is gone, and yet the world still spins, even if it makes no sense to Jellal,  nd a growl has him looking at  the monsters that still  surround them.  He’s exhausted, and there are broken, bitingly painful things in his chest, but rage and grief makes him loosen his hold on her body and stumble to his feet.

               He has no energy, no hope, and yet the magic thunders in him when he prepares to cast Sema.  Maybe it will  kill him.  He’ll be able to destroy her murderers and find peace all at once.

               Isn’t that a happy  thought?

               He prepares himself for a final stand and  -

               “Jellal, look out!”

               Erza’s body presses against him, pushes him out of the way of one of the dragon’s minions. For a moment, he is completely confused, as though he stands between two moments  of time.   In one, Erza is dead, and he’s prepared to join her.   In the other, she’s vitally, beautifully _alive_ and he doesn’t know which is real.

               Which is foolish, because he knows which he prefers.

               It was his nature to question miracles, particularly as they pertain to him, but this once he won’t.  She had been dying in his arms, and now that he had almost lost her, he couldn’t risk losing her again.  So, he accepts this miracle.  He accepts that he knows what’s supposed to  happen next.

               And he casts Grand Chariot, putting what is left of his energy into the attack, and pulling Erza out of the line of fire.  When he collapses amongst the rubble, he takes  her  with him.  He  manages to catch himself, just enough so he won’t  hurt her, but then his arms give out as well, and he rests his head on her  chest.

               He can hear her heart beat, a wild staccato in his ear, and her chest rises and falls rapidly.  Jellal is not  a praying man, but in that  moment he gives thanks to whoever will listen.

               “Jellal.” His name is a soft  murmur, and he manages to  turn his face up, to  look at hers.  Her eyes are soft, and  she reaches  a hand out and runs it through his hair.   He doesn’t care if  it’s selfish of him, to turn into that touch.

               There is a look  in her eyes that says she needs to touch  him.  And may the heavens help him, but he needs to be touched.

               “I…” his voice is a harsh rasp, and he can’t  get beyond that one word.

               _I saw you die._

_I can’t lose you._

_I love you._

Every single statement true, but he can’t say any of them, so instead he musters his strength, and pushes himself up and off of her, away from her all too addicting touch.

               “I died,” she says, as she sits up herself.  She clutches her sword, as if to keep herself grounded, and Jellal can’t look away from her. She touches her chest, where the killing shot had hit, and her fingers curl into a fist.  “How am I not dead, Jellal?”

               In another situation, he perhaps would have figured it out; after all, he’s travelled with Ultear for six years, had worked with her even before that.  He knows nearly as much about her Arc of Time and it’s capabilities as she does.

               But this is not another situation, and his mind is full of nightmares of a potential future where Erza no longer exists, and it’s a future that makes him feel bereft.

               They stare at each other in silence. In the near distance they can hear more of the dragon minions fighting their allies.  Beyond that, there’s the roar of the dragons themselves, and the explosions that can only mean the Dragon Slayers are hard at work.

               Despite all that, neither of them move.

               Until she does, and Jellal’s arms are filled with Erza. Her fingers cradle his cheeks, and it’s entirely too easy to let her tip his head back.  When she seals her lips over his, he wraps his arms around her.  One hand tangles in the scarlet hair that has haunted his dreams for too many years. The other wraps around her lower back and pulls her tight against him.

               Never has anything felt so _right_ , and Jellal thinks he could happily go forever kissing Erza.

               “You were dead,” he gasps out, when they finally break apart, both of them breathing wildly.  They rest their foreheads against each other, and Jellal closes his eyes, the image of her broken body burned on the inside of his eye lids.  He opens them again to meet hers, and he knows he must look  half mad. “You can’t die, Erza. I can’t lose you.”

               _Not again._

He knows what a world that believes Erza Scarlet is dead is like, even if he could never quite believe  her dead himself –not when his heart still beat her name.  He can’t survive a world where she is truly dead.  He’s just not that strong.

               She doesn’t respond to him.  Instead, she just kisses him again, and he’s pretty sure this is what home must feel like.

               Their kisses are frantic and messy, their lips seeking out whatever bare skin they can reach when they separate for breath, before their lips collide again.

               Above them, a dragon roars again, and it reminds them  both  that there is more at stake than each  other and the  desperation  that near death – _actual death? Neither is sure_ – ignited in them.

               “Can you stand?” Erza asks. She’s managed to stumble to her feet  and grab her sword,  resting her weight on the blade.  She offers her hand to Jellal, and he takes it, letting her pull  him  to  his feet.  He has no magic left to give, but he can’t let her out of his sight either.

               Not yet.

               “We need to find your friends,” Jellal says at last.  “We need…”

               He isn’t sure what they need, isn’t sure what can beat these monsters.   It’s certainly not him, and probably not Erza either.

               But as much faith as he has in the woman at his side, he has just as much in her Guild.  Fairy Tail helped make Erza Scarlet into Titania, and Jellal knows if anyone can win this day it is them.

               He knows if they survive this, nothing will really change.  He is still ruined for her – filled with guilt and dark memories he can never escape.   Beyond that, he’s still a wanted convict who couldn’t be with her beyond secret meetings in the dark, and Erza deserves so much more.

               But as they pick their way over rubble, she keeps  his hand in hers, and Jellal doesn’t pull away.

 

              


End file.
